Butcher defends horse meat trade

Vince Garreffa is vowing to continue selling horse meat, despite the death threats

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The butcher who has been given the go-ahead to sell horse meat for human consumption says there has been a small black market in it in Australia for years.

Perth butcher Vince Garreffa began selling horse meat at his store on Tuesday and is vowing to continue, despite receiving death threats from animal liberationists.

But he told ABC News Online that Europeans have been dining on horse meat for centuries and it is an open secret that migrants in Perth go to extreme lengths to get their hands on it.

"If you and I didn't eat Australian lamb for 10 or 20 years and someone showed up with an illegally slaughtered carcass in the boot of their car, I know I'd be the first one to put up my hand to buy a leg," he said.

"You miss it so much; it's a taste of home. And to Europeans, horse is a taste of home. The French go nuts for it and I've found they've gone to the trouble of buying it not only illegally when someone has offered it, but also offered it from pet shops who sell horse for our pets.

"It's very small but it exists.

"At the end of the day it's not an organised black market, the term black market infers a lot of different connotations. The truth is, just like somebody might turn around in Australia and grab an illegal feed of marron and offer it to their friends, somebody along the line eventually has slaughtered some horse.

"Back in the 70s I knew of a favourite pet shop people could trust to say 'I want some horse meat but I want to eat it, I don't want to give it to my pets, so could you make sure it's fresh?' He was famous for handing it over."

Mr Garreffa says Australia has the sixth largest export market for horse meat in the world, slaughtering from 50,000 to 70,000 horses a year for human consumption in countries in Europe and Asia.

He understands that people have an attachment to horses because they have become a companion animal in Australia, but is concerned that buying it illegally could be dangerous, and compares it to the days when people bought kangaroo meat under the counter.

"Because pet meat doesn't have the protocols by the health department, the meat that's slaughtered for pet meat could very well be diseased horses, or horses that are full of steroids and other drugs," he said.

"There's just no way in the world that anybody should be taking a risk of eating that type of meat and I think [WA's Food and Agriculture Minister] has had great courage in allowing a very small, controlled supply.

"I've never heard of anyone dying of kangaroo poisoning but horse from unreliable sources is a much more dangerous affair because of the amount of drugs involved in the horse industry."

Mr Garreffa acknowledges that horse meat is not for everybody and that a lot of people will never consider it as suitable for the plate.

"[It tastes like] beef with a slight sweetness in the back palate. It's a little bit richer, very lean and it has twice the amount of iron than any other red meat, the scientists tell us," he said.

"But not everybody will get over the headspace of thinking about eating one of man's best friends."

He does not believe horse meat should be treated any differently from beef or lamb, but it is clear that not everybody agrees.

Mr Garreffa has received death threats about his decision, both over the phone and via email.

"At first it was a shock. It's words of a nature that whatever was being done to the horses was going to be done to me," he said.

"But the more I think about it over the last couple of days, I realise the amount of passionate people who really do care about animal welfare, and maybe it might not be as dangerous at it sounds."

Despite the death threats, Mr Garreffa says demand for horse meat has been "steady" since Tuesday.

"Just like we don't put pigs heads in the window because they offend people - yet we sell plenty of them in a year - people just come in quietly and ask for one," he said.

"We've now got to a stage because of the furore, people are just sneaking in, quietly whispering that they'd like some horse meat and we sell it to them quietly. So we've become the horse whisperers."